"NATURAL RELIGIONS 613 



In the same manner he shows that justice and order depend upon 

 the stability of the imperial power : " Justice is strongest in the 

 world when it is in one who is most willing and most powerful ; only 

 the Monarch is this ; therefore, only when Justice is in the Monarch is 

 it strongest in the world. ... All concord depends on unity which is 

 in wills ; the human race, when it is at its best, is a kind of concord ; 

 for as one man at his best is a kind of concord, and as the like is true 

 of the family, the city, and the kingdom ; so is it of the whole human 

 race. Therefore, the human race at its best depends on the unity 

 which is in will. But this can not be unless there be one will to be 

 the single mistress and regulating influence of all the rest. And this 

 can not be unless there is one prince over all, whose will shall be the 

 mistress and regulating influence of all the others. But if all these 

 conclusions be true, as they are, it is necessary for the highest welfare 

 of the human race that there should be a Monarch in the world ; and, 

 therefore, Monarchy is necessary for the good of the world." * 



It is curious to remark that for a moment Dante seems to have 

 caught sight of the modern point of view in regard to supreme power 

 in the political and religious world. He is arguing against the medi- 

 aeval symbolism which saw in the sun and moon the types of the two 

 great powers on earth : "Seeing that these two kinds of power are, in 

 a sense, accidents of men, God woidd tints appear to have used a per- 

 verted order, by producing the accidents before the essence to which they 

 belong existed.'''' In the same way we should argue, extending the 

 terms, that before the essential point of government in the political 

 and religious world, viz., order and morality, became distinctly con- 

 scious in the minds of men, their accidents, the divine state and the 

 divine Church, came into being. This view, however, he summarily 

 rejects : " It is ridiculous to say this of God. For the two great 

 lights were created on the fourth day, while man was not created till 

 the sixth day, as is evident in the text of Scripture." f 



The real secret of the persistence of the supernatural in an age of 

 science is the tacit allowance that "what can not be demonstrated by 

 observation not to exist may be taken as existing for purposes of edi- 

 fication." I For many years to come we shall probably continue to 

 meet in the same communities with what would at first appear to be 

 strange inconsistencies. Thus, at the end of August, Montreal was 

 welcoming with open arms the high-priests of the new faith, the lead- 

 ers of the American scientific world. Little more than a fortnight 

 afterward, they were expressing their devout gratitude to the Giver of 

 all good for enabling British soldiers to crush the wretched Egyptian, 

 and add to the luster and renown of British arms.* And to those who 



* " De Monarchia," Book I, chaps, xi-xv. f Ibid., Book III, chap. iv. 

 X Leslie Stephen. 



* On September 16th a resolution was passed by a public meeting of the citizens of 

 Montreal, expressing " devoted loyalty to her Majesty's crown and Government," and 



